DAY FOR NIGHT
by vanhunks
Summary: J/C Companion piece to "Submission". Kathryn, coerced into a sexual relationship with Chakotay, has reached the end of her tether. Set during and after "Caretaker".


** Day for Night**

**a companion piece to SUBMISSION**

_vanhunks_

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This short fic is a companion piece to "SUBMISSION".

SUMMARY: Kathryn, coerced into a sexual relationship with Chakotay, has reached the end of her tether. Set during and after "Caretaker".

DAY FOR NIGHT

She dreaded the nights now. Going off duty meant walking towards her quarters, every step filled with trepidation, knowing that the night would not belong to her, that soon after she'd measure her steps to _his_ quarters.

It ate at her, corroded every good sense, every benevolent thought towards him. There had been none to begin with, no niceties, no courtesies, just a hard bargaining that she lost. She had pitted her wits against him, tried everything to save herself and spare her crew, to journey seventy five years knowing that she'd explore all human possibilities to hasten their return home.

In the end, she lost.

In his quarters. In his bed. His lover by night, his captain by day.

By day not a glimmer, a sheen, a whisper of her unrestrained abandon in his arms, of his control, not of steel, but subtle malevolence clothed in dark leather and long boots. A look, just a look and all she could do was crawl into his bed and submit to his demands. By day they joked, sparred, played Velocity, held meetings. By day she could force her mind to suppress all images and memories of her nightly submission. She could be Captain Janeway, walk proudly down the corridors of her ship and spend a few minutes with a crewman here, an officer there. Her rank pips felt close to her skin, even through the fabric of her turtleneck and that gave her comfort that she was in command, and that he… that he had to bow to her decrees.

By day she could plot a course for home.

By night, her course home was plotted for her.

By night he owned her. After that first night, an invitation, the threat of malice veiled, her instinctive abhorrence to being his fuck slave, her equally instinctive denial swamped by the memory of his lips and hands on her body, warm, urgent, hard, soft, his deep penetration, her greed which up until then had been a dormant sensation all her life… All cruelly exposed by him. How he had known that she would comply to his request…?

By night she fought him, called him all manner of names, cursed the heavens while her body hungered for his cruel touches.

She had cried when her father died, when her fiancé died. She had cried when, a prisoner in a Cardassian stronghold, she had to listen how Owen Paris had been tortured.

From the moment Chakotay stood in her ready room, bargaining for the Maquis, she had refused to allow herself that luxury. It _ was_ a luxury; it was also a tenacious hold on her control not to let him see how his submission of her got to her.

Kathryn closed her eyes remembering the night she finally let go, if only for a few terrible seconds, in the heat of her climax revealing her feelings for him. After that, she never let her guard down again, never once shed a tear even though her bitterness, her silent outrage caused her to want to cry out.

"You can hide, Kathryn, but you'll always come here…"

And she did. Most nights during the last five months. He turned her body into something that hungered constantly, a vessel that needed to be filled. Not once did he break. The aggressive face, the hard hands, the teeth that clawed her skin, the flesh that invaded her, the softness near the end of their fucking, remained. It was as if he fought too, to remain in control, to see her surrender to him. And sometimes, the smile which she couldn't, with the best will in the world, translate into something gentle, caring, and heaven knows, loving, was a smile of the conqueror.

In the early hours of the morning, sated from their harsh lovemaking, her outrage, curses, her unshed tears long dissolved to compliance, she looked forward to the new day, when she could be Captain Kathryn Janeway, master and commander of a Voyager crew.

_I can't anymore _was her wordless plea as she exited the turbolift and made her way to her quarters.

_No more…_

Inside her quarters, her eyes were dark with pain, knowing what she was about to do. She prepared herself something to eat. Her hands shook as she lifted her cup, the tea sweet and sticky, but warm as she drank. She had decided to remain in uniform on this night, with the distant thought that it might make Chakotay a little softer, less angry than he had been most nights they made love. It was a hopeless, vain thought that somehow, her response, her aching acquiescence to the inevitable lure of his body, his heated, urgent touches, the sudden entry into her body at times, the slow, at others the deliberate opening of her legs before he entered her in a long, single stroke, would change him.

_"You've won, Chakotay. I've lost my ship to you; my crew respect you. I've lost myself to you; I love you. But not this way…not this way.."_

Tears sprang to her eyes for the first time in months. She thought how she hated him and loved him at the same time, how he never once uttered any softness, never once, even at the height of his passion, let slip words like 'I love you', never called her name in a way that gave what he was doing to her body any meaning. What was he? What?

He was too angry, too intent on keeping her under him to care. Once when she told him she loved him, she remembered that night how her heart pained, how her senses died and how shame swamped her when he smiled a knowing smile. The smile of the conqueror.

_No more…_

Kathryn rose unsteadily from the table, her food half eaten, stumbling to her room. She looked at a picture of her parents on her bedstand. Her mother had worn a soft, pale blue dress and her father his dress uniform on that day for the renewal of their marriage vows just before he died.

_I let you down. A man has taken over my body and made it his. I have little control. I can't help myself. My body betrayed me and now my heart has betrayed me… Forgive me. I can't anymore… _

With trembling fingers she brushed over the smooth surface of the photograph, briefly resting on their warm smiles, their mutual love that had been so plain for all to see. A soft cry escaped her and jerkily she drew away from the picture.

Her body felt light, shivering. A new anticipation took hold of her. Kathryn bit her lip trying to stem the growing nervousness. It was almost time to go. He always expected her just after she finished her meal.

_No more…_

Suddenly, her mind clear, she walked across the floor and stood in front of the replicator. While she gave it its command, visions of Voyager, of her crew, its shuttles, the worlds they visited came to her. She could hear Neelix's voice, hear Tom Paris as he teased B'Elanna, saw Tuvok, always so unsmiling, so terse, so logical… One by one each crewman and officer filled her vision, some smiling, others curious as they bent over their work, all of them kind, benevolent.

She loved them, her crew, her people.

_His_ face remained in a scowl, as if he berated her on being late to his bed.

"I can't do this anymore, Chakotay," she whispered painfully as she lifted the glass with its soft green contents to her lips. "No human can endure what I endure. My body, my soul, my heart, my life needs reciprocation… I am empty. I am nothing. I cannot see the day anymore, for now my days are becoming blurred by the night's entreaties for kind words…"

A tear rolled down her cheek as she took a first sip, pulling her face as the sour-bitter flavour hit her nostrils.

_I am only human… I want my nights to reflect my days. I want my nights… O, God… Give me back my nights…"_

She felt her body go limp, light, floating. The sensation was pleasant. The muscles in her neck relaxed; her head began to roll back. Very distantly she heard someone swearing, a voice that rose above the noise in her head.

"Kathryn! Kathryn!"

She stared with glazed eyes at the owner of the voice, at Chakotay, dressed like a Maquis. Why was there fire and water in his eyes? she wondered dazedly.

"No more, Chakotay… No more…" she murmured as she collapsed in his arms, the empty glass crashing to the floor..

END

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